Video Collaboration Service Frame Freeze Mechanism
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current video collaboration services face challenges in preventing conflicting user actions during collaborative video review sessions, leading to inefficiencies and increased computing resources required, as multiple users struggle to simultaneously provide comments or drawing annotations without disrupting each other's ideas.
Innovation Solution
A video collaboration service that maintains joint state data to synchronize video playback and annotations across client devices, freezing the current frame when a freeze condition is detected to prevent conflicting actions, allowing users to complete frame-specific actions before moving on, and displaying visual video freeze indications to manage user interactions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If multiple users simultaneously provide comments or drawing annotations on the same video, then collaborative review capability is improved, but user actions conflict and block communicated ideas
Solution Approach 1:
The system applies preliminary anti-action by detecting when a user initiates a frame-specific action (comment or drawing annotation) and proactively freezing the video playback before conflicting actions can occur. This prevents the harmful effect of simultaneous conflicting edits while maintaining collaborative capability, as other users' playback controls are disabled until the first user completes their action.
2Speed
If video playback is allowed to move freely during collaboration, then viewing efficiency is improved, but frames are moved away before all collaborators present their ideas
Solution Approach 1:
The system applies dynamics by making video playback state changeable based on user actions. The playback can move freely when no frame-specific actions are pending, but automatically freezes when a user initiates such an action. This dynamic adjustment optimizes both viewing efficiency (when free movement is possible) and collaboration completeness (when freezing preserves the current frame for discussion).
3Device complexity
If conflicting user actions are allowed, then system simplicity is maintained, but computing time and network resource requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system introduces an intermediary mechanism (the freeze condition detection and enforcement system) that mediates between multiple users' actions. This intermediary monitors user actions, detects conflicts, and automatically resolves them by freezing playback when needed. While this adds some system complexity, it dramatically improves productivity by preventing wasted computing time and network resources from handling conflicting simultaneous edits.
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
AI summary
Techniques are disclosed for avoiding conflicting user actions while the users synchronously participate in collaborative video review based on joint state data for a video collaboration session. User actions may conflict, e.g., when a user submits a video playback instruction to change the current frame of the session while another user is performing a frame-specific action on the current frame. The video collaboration service freezes the current frame in joint state data based on detecting that a frame-specific action is being performed or is likely imminent. Detecting a freeze condition may be implicit or explicit. In order to unfreeze the current frame of the joint state data, no active freeze conditions may be in effect. Further, the freeze condition may be lifted implicitly or explicitly. A visual video freeze indication may be displayed by one or more client applications participating in the session while a freeze condition is active.